Collective Amnesia and the Symbolic Power of Oneness
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COLLECTIVE FORGETTING AND THE SYMBOLIC POWER OF ONENESS: THE STRANGE APOTHEOSIS OF ROSA PARKS Barry Schwartz Department of Sociology University of Georgia Collective forgetting refers to what is unregistered in the imagination of the individual, unchronicled in research monographs and textbooks, and/or uncommemorated by monuments, relics, statues, and ritual observances. A metaphor for failure to transmit information about the past, collective forgetting refers not only to people‘s forgetting events they once knew but also to having never known them in the first place. One example of this phenomenon involves America‘s most prominent civil rights heroine: Rosa Parks. Why have so many men and women whose conduct was more consequential than Mrs. Parks‘s been forgotten? What does society gain from their oblivion? William Goode (1978) observed many years ago that ―winners in various kinds of competition, even when they are marked off from the losers by minute differences in performance, or, (as in science) by narrow differences in the time of discovery or achievement, seem to be given far greater amounts of prestige than those differences would appear to justify‖(p.66). Because it usually costs less (in terms of attention) to admire a field‘s best (a single task) than to admire its first and second best (a multiple task), Goode‘s explanation of why the magnitude of reward is often out of proportion to achievement is persuasive, but it skirts the related questions of (1) whether people are unwilling or unable to admire slightly less adept performers, and (2) why these performers not only fail to receive due credit but are often forgotten altogether. COGNITION AND MEMORY: CAPACITY LIMITS Two premises frame our present understanding of forgetting. First, the central nervous system‘s capacity to organize, store, and retrieve information is severely limited. Although human long-term memory is almost infinite (during an average lifetime it will have accumulated more than five times the information contained in all the printed material in the world [Marois 1 2005:30]), much of this material fades from disuse, is ―overwritten‖ by more recently acquired knowledge, or coded to make it irretrievable by working memory (Vockell 2006). Direct demonstration provides the most accurate measure of cognitive limits. The parietal cortex, according to recent magnetic resonance image (MRI) studies, becomes more active as more objects (visual images, concepts, plans, people, and other chunks of information) are held in working memory, but once its limit of four objects (on average) is reached, the adding of more objects causes no further increase in cortex activity (Marois 2005. See also Ricoeur 2004) The second premise is that individuals adapt to the limits of their long- and short-term memory by ―heuristic‖ strategies enabling them to ignore most of the information to which they are exposed. History buffs, therefore, can name all American presidents; few vice-presidents. The typical baseball fan can identify last year‘s division winners in both American and National leagues but probably knows few if any of the respective second-place winners. Olympic (first place) Gold Medal recipients are far more likely to be remembered than (second and third place) recipients of Silver and Bronze Medals. In science, literature, and artistic award ceremonies, all nominees are known but winners alone are remembered. However, this tendency toward ―oneness‖ cannot result exclusively from cognitive limits. Oneness Oneness is a confusing term beset by contradictory definitions: in the popular realm it concerns singularity and uniqueness; in many religious belief systems, it is the condition of being at one with fellow believers and transcendent powers. In this essay, oneness refers to the recognizing of one exceptional individual and ignoring of others, many of whom may have performed as well as or better than the one acclaimed. 2 Oneness, as an adaptation to cognition‘s limits, is always ―realm-specific.‖ In baseball, for example, separate awards are given for the ―Most Valuable Player,‖ for the highest batting average, most home runs, most strikeouts, most wins, lowest earned run average, and other offensive and defensive achievements. Beauty pageants produce a general winner (Miss America) and winners in various sub-competitions (talent, bathing suit, evening gown, congeniality). In the academic world, awards are given in different disciplines and sub- disciplines for the most distinguished careers, books, and articles. The Pulitzer Prizes, Academy Awards, Tony Awards, and Nobel Prizes are also examples of single awards given within different realms of achievement These awards not only reflect organizations‘ need for exemplars to articulate their ideals but also the convention of exemplifying each ideal by one person. Contingencies The relationship between nature and convention, between cognitive capacity limits and the practice of limiting recognition to single recipients, must be qualified. 1. Because working memory‘s limit, according to most investigators, is four bits of information (Cowan 2005), nature alone cannot account for the phenomenon of oneness. 2. Cognitive limits can be transcended at will. Baseball experts, for example, possess vast knowledge of many categories of offensive and defensive performance. This is possible because their working memory encodes every relevant chunk of new information, transfers it to long-term memory, where it is aligned meaningfully through typing, classification, and schema, then stored, with relevant existing information. The constant interplay between efficient encoding and organizing of information in working and long-term memory distinguishes ―experts‖ from ―novices‖ (Ericsson and Kinch 1995: 239-240). 3 That many individuals are motivated to acquire vast knowledge in one or more realms of activity (usually occupational) means that oneness is the default option, not the sole option, for human cognition. But individuals mastering one or more bodies of knowledge cannot master all there is to know. Even they are ―cognitive misers‖ because they oversimplify reality by ignoring its ―details;‖ but they are also ―motivated tacticians‖ because deliberate ignoring of information allows them to attend to the most relevant and complex tasks. Short cuts, no less than prolonged attention to complex problems, are tactically motivated (Fiske and Taylor 1991, p.13). 3. The more knowledge one has of the achievement realm within which a person is recognized, the more likely he or she will know of others who have accomplished at least as much or more. Singular recognition is most likely to promote resentment among insiders. 4. The singling out of winners reinforces or undermines social structures. Among individualistic communities, ―winner take all‖ situations are most common, while egalitarian communities believe singling out winners undermines group solidarity and individual esteem. Differentiation of a field also affects the feasibility of single awards. Between 1902 and 1949, for example, 85 percent of Nobel Prizes in physics were given to single recipients; 2 percent, to three recipients. Between 1950 and 1999, single recipients received only 26 percent of the awards; three recipients received 38 percent. In six of the first seven years of the twenty-first century, three recipients shared the prize. Physics produces more winners as it becomes more complex and innovative. It should be noted, however, that the Nobel Committee has never awarded its prize to more than three physicists in any one year—a number that happens to be within working memory‘s limits. 5. The media through which information is transmitted restricts the amount any individual can possess. A history text can devote only a limited number of pages to a given 4 event; a newspaper or magazine, only so many columns; television and radio stations, only so many minutes (Hilgartner and Bosk 1988). Media limits add to the effect of cognitive limits. 6. When no single representative can be selected to symbolize a field of activity, the pool of ―contestants‖ can be condensed into a single unit and identified by their number. The Little Rock Nine, namely, the three boys and six girls chosen by the NAACP to integrate the Little Rock Central High School in 1957, is a relevant example. Nine individuals are easy to forget, but when condensed into one name are readily remembered. 7. Not all events in the collective memory are symbolized by a single person or collectivity. In the sport of baseball, for example, pairs and trios often represent something special about a team or an achievement. The Boston Braves of the late 1940s depended heavily on two pitchers, Warren Spahn and Johnny Sain—hence the cautious war-cry: ―Spahn and Sain, and pray for rain.‖ Likewise, early twentieth-century baseball fans represented the difficult double-play by its supposed virtuosi, ―Tinker to Evers to Chance.‖ In other fields, including entertainment, duos and (Sonny and Cher) trios (Peter, Paul, and Mary) are recognized individually. Future work will determine whether duos and trios are exceptions to, or different forms of, oneness, but raising the question must not prevent us from exploring the phenomenon of oneness itself. The concept of oneness describes a non-universal but powerful tendency for individuals and groups to simplify complex comparisons by choosing one prominent performer. This tendency is reinforced by memory‘s limits, but such a hindrance does not make single awards imperative. Why, then, does a conventional limit—the recognition of one person—exaggerate a natural (cognitive) limit which, although obdurate, permits the recognition of several people. Why is human convention so stingy, why does it cause us to remember so few and forget so 5 many, what social realities does it reinforce, and how does the answer to these questions bear on our general understanding of collective forgetting? Rosa Parks, as noted, is the case in point. THE RISE OF ROSA PARKS Forgotten Events and Protesters Throughout the Jim Crow era, many African Americans rebelled against segregated seating in public transportation, but their number vastly increased after World War II.